1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is broadly concerned with glass/nanoparticle composites, and especially composites containing embedded nanocrystals having desirable electrooptical properties allowing the composites to be used in high density recording media. More particularly, the invention is concerned with such composites, and methods of fabrication thereof, wherein the composites include a glass matrix body with rare earth iron garnet nanoparticles embedded therein. The composites are manufactured by contacting a suitable porous glass with a colloidal dispersion of nanoparticles to fill the glass pores, followed by heating of the treated glass to effect fusing of the glass matrix pores.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Ferromagnetic fine particles such as nanoparticles have attracted considerable attention from researchers in recent years. This interest stems from the fact that such particles are single magnetic domain particles and accordingly their magnetic properties and their mutual interaction can be studied without magnetic domain effects. Moreover, quantum size effects and the magnetic quantum tunneling effects of these particles can be studied because of their nanoparticle dimensions. From an industrial standpoint, such magnetic particles can be used as media for high-density magnetic or magneto-optical information source.
In light of these considerations, efforts have been made in the past to prepare nanoparticle compositions using a variety of different methods. A consistent problem with these prior techniques has been the tendency of the magnetic nanoparticles to spontaneously coagulate. Thus, the intrinsic magnetic characteristics of the nanoparticles are often difficult or impossible to discern even though the nanoparticle compositions were initially successfully prepared. A number of methods have been proposed to prevent the coagulation of magnetic nanoparticles, such as to disperse the particles in an organic binder (O'Grady et al., J. Magn. Mater., 95:341 (1991)), or to disperse the particles in a solvent with an aid of a surfactant (Rosenweig, Ferrohydrodynamics, Cambridge University Press, 1985). These methods use mechanical stirring to disperse the particles, but nevertheless a considerable portion of the particles remain coagulated if the particle concentration is high.
In other research, magnetic fine particle precursors have been dispersed in sol-state glass precursor, the magnetic particles were precipitated in solidified glass or simple magnetic fine particles (e.g., elemental iron or cobalt or simple crystalline structure such as iron oxide) were introduced into the pores of porous glass. However, owing to the fact that these techniques involve the precipitation of precursor particles into a glass matrix, or ion sputtering on porous glass, it has been difficult to control the fabrication of the products. As a consequence, these methods have not been applicable using fine particles of complex crystalline structure.